Extract from The Guardian
Energy economist says preliminary report makes clear South Australian
event was ‘a transmission failure, not a generation failure’
The Australian Energy Market Operator has pointed to South
Australia’s extreme weather last week as the prime cause of “multiple
transmission system faults” resulting in a statewide blackout.
In a preliminary report the regulator cites severe weather as the factor triggering the transmission system failures “including, in the space of 12 seconds, the loss of three major 275kV transmission lines north of Adelaide.”
In addition to the transmission lines, Aemo notes in the late afternoon, after “multiple faults in a short period”, 315mW of wind generation disconnected, which affected the region north of Adelaide.
It says that uncontrolled diminution in power generation “increased the flow on the main Victorian interconnector [Heywood] to make up the deficit, and resulted in the interconnector overloading”. The overload of the Heywood interconnector tripped the system, which caused the blackout.
The report also notes that in the lead-up to the statewide blackout, generation reduction occurred at six windfarms, while there was no reduction in thermal generation.
Aemo says each reduction coincided with a drop in voltage observed at the windfarms’ connection points, but it says it is too soon to say why: “Additional analysis is required to determine the reasons for the reduction in generation and observed voltage levels before any conclusions can be drawn.”
Energy economist Bruce Mountain told Guardian Australia the report, while preliminary, made it abundantly clear that the South Australian event was “a transmission failure, not a generation failure.”
He said it was clear the primary event creating the sequence leading to the blackout was the failure of three major transmission lines. By the time the third transmission line went out, it was “game over”, he said.
Mountain noted the report had identified localised issues with windfarms, possibly linked to lightning strikes during the storm, “but kind of ‘so what?’ This happens all the time in an electricity system.”
He said there was nothing in the report to suggest wind was a more unreliable technology than any other technology in an electricity system: “The production or not from these windfarms would have made no difference to the ability to sustain supply in South Australia after those three 275kV lines had been dropped.”
The Australian Energy Council’s chief executive, Matthew Warren, assessed the material differently. He said the report indicated governments and regulators “need to think differently about how we run a decarbonising electricity system, reflecting the significant differences between using conventional thermal generation compared to a mix with higher levels of intermittent renewables.”
The prime minister, Malcolm Turnbull, last week linked the SA blackout explicitly to the state’s use of renewable energy, calling it a “wake-up call” for state leaders who were trying to hit “completely unrealistic” renewable targets.
A special meeting of energy ministers has been convened in Canberra to discuss last week’s events.
Speaking to reporters in Sydney on Wednesday, Turnbull said the cause of the blackout was “storms disrupting transmission lines”.
He repeated the sequence identified by the Aemo report: transmission lines were knocked over, this disrupted the supply of power across the state, “including from renewable sources, including from the various windfarms, beyond Adelaide”.
“And that then in turn put extra strain on the interconnector with Victoria, which caused it to shut down. So it was a cascading blackout – it happened very quickly – but this issue of energy security is one that we have to take very, very seriously,” Turnbull said.
He continued to point the finger at South Australia.
He said the state had the highest wholesale energy costs in the country, and that wasn’t good for jobs, or investment. He said the SA premier, Jay Weatherill, “has to answer for that”.
The prime minister listed a hierarchy of priorities with energy.
Turnbull said rule number one was “keep the lights on”. Rule number two was “we have to ensure energy is affordable”. The third priority he identified was emissions reduction “in accordance with our international obligations”.
In Adelaide, Weatherill said the Aemo report pointed the finger squarely at extreme weather as the cause of the statewide blackouts, not the impact of renewables.
“Malcolm Turnbull, our PM, took the first opportunity to lecture South Australians about the dangers of renewable energy, and for the Labor states in promoting unrealistic renewable energy targets,” the premier told reporters on Wednesday.
Weatherill said Turnbull’s comments were “in contradiction of the oral advice that we were receiving from the Aemo”.
“The PM was fearful that he would be blamed by the right wing of his party for pushing into renewable energy when he knows that he leads a party which is dominated by coal interests,” the premier said.
“It’s deeply disappointing that we do not have the national leadership which is necessary to deal with this and other issues.”
South Australia has also signalled that it will raise the idea of applying an emissions intensity trading system to the electricity market at Friday’s meeting – but the environment and energy minister, Josh Frydenberg, has already dead-batted that push.
The ACT – which has a bipartisan renewable energy target of 100% renewables by 2020 – has urged the federal government to get its story straight on renewable energy.
Deputy chief minister, Simon Corbell, says the former environment minister Greg Hunt, on the sidelines of global climate talks in Paris last December, had clearly urged the states to adopt reverse auctions, following the model developed successfully in the ACT to drive the uptake of renewable energy.
Now, less than a year later, the government was blasting state renewable energy targets as being reckless and insufficiently attentive to energy security. “The inconsistency here is very clear,” Corbell told Guardian Australia on Tuesday.
In a preliminary report the regulator cites severe weather as the factor triggering the transmission system failures “including, in the space of 12 seconds, the loss of three major 275kV transmission lines north of Adelaide.”
In addition to the transmission lines, Aemo notes in the late afternoon, after “multiple faults in a short period”, 315mW of wind generation disconnected, which affected the region north of Adelaide.
It says that uncontrolled diminution in power generation “increased the flow on the main Victorian interconnector [Heywood] to make up the deficit, and resulted in the interconnector overloading”. The overload of the Heywood interconnector tripped the system, which caused the blackout.
The report also notes that in the lead-up to the statewide blackout, generation reduction occurred at six windfarms, while there was no reduction in thermal generation.
Aemo says each reduction coincided with a drop in voltage observed at the windfarms’ connection points, but it says it is too soon to say why: “Additional analysis is required to determine the reasons for the reduction in generation and observed voltage levels before any conclusions can be drawn.”
Energy economist Bruce Mountain told Guardian Australia the report, while preliminary, made it abundantly clear that the South Australian event was “a transmission failure, not a generation failure.”
He said it was clear the primary event creating the sequence leading to the blackout was the failure of three major transmission lines. By the time the third transmission line went out, it was “game over”, he said.
Mountain noted the report had identified localised issues with windfarms, possibly linked to lightning strikes during the storm, “but kind of ‘so what?’ This happens all the time in an electricity system.”
He said there was nothing in the report to suggest wind was a more unreliable technology than any other technology in an electricity system: “The production or not from these windfarms would have made no difference to the ability to sustain supply in South Australia after those three 275kV lines had been dropped.”
The Australian Energy Council’s chief executive, Matthew Warren, assessed the material differently. He said the report indicated governments and regulators “need to think differently about how we run a decarbonising electricity system, reflecting the significant differences between using conventional thermal generation compared to a mix with higher levels of intermittent renewables.”
The prime minister, Malcolm Turnbull, last week linked the SA blackout explicitly to the state’s use of renewable energy, calling it a “wake-up call” for state leaders who were trying to hit “completely unrealistic” renewable targets.
A special meeting of energy ministers has been convened in Canberra to discuss last week’s events.
Speaking to reporters in Sydney on Wednesday, Turnbull said the cause of the blackout was “storms disrupting transmission lines”.
He repeated the sequence identified by the Aemo report: transmission lines were knocked over, this disrupted the supply of power across the state, “including from renewable sources, including from the various windfarms, beyond Adelaide”.
“And that then in turn put extra strain on the interconnector with Victoria, which caused it to shut down. So it was a cascading blackout – it happened very quickly – but this issue of energy security is one that we have to take very, very seriously,” Turnbull said.
He continued to point the finger at South Australia.
He said the state had the highest wholesale energy costs in the country, and that wasn’t good for jobs, or investment. He said the SA premier, Jay Weatherill, “has to answer for that”.
The prime minister listed a hierarchy of priorities with energy.
Turnbull said rule number one was “keep the lights on”. Rule number two was “we have to ensure energy is affordable”. The third priority he identified was emissions reduction “in accordance with our international obligations”.
In Adelaide, Weatherill said the Aemo report pointed the finger squarely at extreme weather as the cause of the statewide blackouts, not the impact of renewables.
“Malcolm Turnbull, our PM, took the first opportunity to lecture South Australians about the dangers of renewable energy, and for the Labor states in promoting unrealistic renewable energy targets,” the premier told reporters on Wednesday.
Weatherill said Turnbull’s comments were “in contradiction of the oral advice that we were receiving from the Aemo”.
“The PM was fearful that he would be blamed by the right wing of his party for pushing into renewable energy when he knows that he leads a party which is dominated by coal interests,” the premier said.
“It’s deeply disappointing that we do not have the national leadership which is necessary to deal with this and other issues.”
South Australia has also signalled that it will raise the idea of applying an emissions intensity trading system to the electricity market at Friday’s meeting – but the environment and energy minister, Josh Frydenberg, has already dead-batted that push.
The ACT – which has a bipartisan renewable energy target of 100% renewables by 2020 – has urged the federal government to get its story straight on renewable energy.
Deputy chief minister, Simon Corbell, says the former environment minister Greg Hunt, on the sidelines of global climate talks in Paris last December, had clearly urged the states to adopt reverse auctions, following the model developed successfully in the ACT to drive the uptake of renewable energy.
Now, less than a year later, the government was blasting state renewable energy targets as being reckless and insufficiently attentive to energy security. “The inconsistency here is very clear,” Corbell told Guardian Australia on Tuesday.
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